|
E-mail this page to a friend!
Medicare Drug Program News
Senate Passes Bill to Stop Seizure of Drugs from
Canada
Sen. Nelson (D-Fla.): This will ensure Americans,
especially the frail, elderly have a chance of affording the medications
that they need.
July 13, 2006 – Senior citizens and other Americans
may soon be able to purchase drugs from Canada at prices many claim are
even lower than those offered by the Medicare drug plans. The Senate passed the
bill on Tuesday, following increased enforcement of the ban by Custom
and FDA officials. The House has already passed provisions to allow
imported drugs but the move is opposed by the White House, according to
a report by KaiserNet.org.
 Senate Approves Legislation That Would Allow the
Reimportation of Prescription Drugs From Canada
The Senate on Tuesday voted 68-32 to approve an
amendment that would prohibit seizures by
U.S. Customs and Border Protection of prescription drugs
purchased from Canadian pharmacies by U.S. residents, the
Los Angeles Times reports (Girion, Los Angeles Times, 7/12).
| |
Related Stories |
|
| |
Medicare Says Drug Plans are Negotiating 'Large
Discounts' for Seniors
CMS disagrees with Democrats who want government to
be negotiators
July 3, 2006 – As an answer to demands by Democrats
in Congress that Medicare be allowed to negotiate better drug prices and
complaints by consumer groups that drug plan prices are increasing
rapidly,
the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has released a study
showing the private drug plans are negotiating "large discounts" for
Medicare beneficiaries that "have increased over time." The study also
says only 8 percent those in the drug program will be effected by the
"doughnut hole" coverage gap.
Read
more...
Democrats to Offer Legislation for Medicare to
Negotiate Drug Prices
GOP wants faster payments to druggists, doctors
unhappy with formularies
June 27, 2006 – Democrats say they will introduce
legislation today to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices – a move
most say can save millions of dollars for the prescription drug program.
At the same time, Republicans in Congress are trying to press for faster
payments for pharmacies by the drug plans and doctors are complaining
about the drug formularies, according to KaiserNet.org.
Read
more...
Medicare Part D Drug Prices Jumped 3.7% in Last Five
Months
Now 46% higher than prices negotiated by Department of Veteran Affairs
 June 21, 2006 - Over the past five months,
virtually all Medicare (Part D) plans raised their prices for the top
drugs prescribed to senior citizens, according to a report issued
yesterday by the health consumer organization Families USA. The report,
based on pricing data submitted by the plans to the federal government,
contradicts the Bush Administration's assertions that the new Medicare
drug program is effectively moderating rising drug costs, according to
Families USA.
Read more...
Read more
Medicare Drug Program |
|
Customs officials have seized thousands of packages
of prescription drugs sent from Canadian pharmacies to U.S. residents
since Nov. 17, 2005, when the agency began to increase enforcement of
federal laws that restrict the purchase of prescription drugs from
abroad.
The purchase of medications from abroad is illegal,
but customs and FDA officials generally have allowed the practice. Some
Canadian pharmacy officials have said that they believe the increased
seizures are related to the launch of the new Medicare prescription drug
benefit.
Customs officials in February acknowledged the
increased enforcement against the purchase of medications from abroad
but said the policy change was not related to the launch of the Medicare
prescription drug benefit (Kaiser
Daily Health Policy Report, 3/14). Sen. David Vitter (R-La.)
proposed the amendment as part of the fiscal year 2007 Homeland Security
appropriations bill (Strohm, CongressDaily, 7/11). No Senate Democrats
opposed the amendment (McCormack,
The Hill, 7/12).
House Bills
The House has approved two FY 2007 appropriations bills -- Homeland
Security and Agriculture -- that include provisions to allow the
purchase of prescription drugs from abroad, according to Kirstin Brost,
a spokesperson for
House Appropriations Committee ranking member David Obey
(D-Wis.) (AP/San
Francisco Chronicle, 7/12).
The provision included in the House Homeland
Security appropriations bill would allow the purchase of prescription
drugs from any nation (Los Angeles Times, 7/12). According to the
AP/Chronicle, the "Bush administration has opposed efforts to loosen the
restrictions" on the purchase of prescription drugs from abroad, and FDA
officials have said that the agency "cannot guarantee the safety of
imported drugs" (AP/San Francisco Chronicle, 7/12).
Reaction
Vitter called the passage of the amendment a "breakthrough" on the issue
of prescription drug reimportation and "the first clean vote on the
issue in the Senate" (Crowley, CQ Today, 7/11).
He added, "We should demand that (Customs and
Border Protection) focus on the true priority that we face on the war on
terror. Stripping small amounts of prescription drugs from the hands of
seniors ... should not be a priority."
Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Fla.) said, "This is going to
ensure that Americans, especially the frail, elderly or those with
debilitating conditions, are going to be able to at least have a chance
of affording the medications that they need."
However, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) said that the
amendment would lead to "a massive hole in our capacity to secure our
borders and protect ourselves." He added, "If I were a creative
terrorist, I would say to myself, 'Hey, listen, all I've got to do is
produce a can here that says 'Lipitor' on it, make it look like the
original Lipitor bottle, which isn't too hard to do, fill it with
anthrax'" (AP/San Francisco Chronicle, 7/11).
Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) said, "There's a
profound risk ... with respect to these drugs that come in. This is a
dangerous, dangerous piece of legislation" (CongressDaily, 7/11). Ken
Johnson, a spokesperson for the
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said
that the amendment "undermines the U.S. Customs and Border Protection
from doing its job of protecting Americans as well as protecting our
borders. It also undermines the government's ability to assure the
American public that our drug supply is safe and secure" (Shields,
Baton Rouge Advocate, 7/12). Customs officials did not
respond to requests for comment on the amendment (Los Angeles Times,
7/12).
Counterfeit Rx Hearing
In related news, lawmakers and pharmacy industry experts on Tuesday at a
House hearing said that FDA should implement federal standards to
prevent the entry of counterfeit prescription drugs to the U.S. market,
CQ HealthBeat reports.
At a House Government Reform
Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources
hearing, Rep. Gil Gutknecht (R-Minn.), said, "Ultimately, we're going to
end up with 50 different regulations. What we've encountered from the
FDA so far is little more than foot dragging."
However, Randall Lutter, acting associate
commissioner for policy and planning at FDA, said the agency has taken
action to address the issue of counterfeit prescription drugs.
FDA in June
announced plans to require prescription drug distributors to
document the chain of custody, or pedigree, of medications that enter
the U.S. market as of Dec. 1. Lutter said that the requirement will not
include electronic tracking of prescriptions because the transition to
the technology will take time.
According to CQ HealthBeat, witnesses at the
hearing "advocated the need for 'track' and 'trace' technologies and
said accompanying resources and consistency would be necessary to make
the system work." Carmen Catizone, executive director of the
National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, said, "We're not
happy that the states are embarking on this individually without a
national standard" (Barrett, CQ HealthBeat, 7/11).
"Reprinted with
permission from kaisernetwork.org You can view the entire
Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, and sign up
for email delivery at
www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser
Daily Health Policy Report is published for
kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family
Foundation. © 2006 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation.
All rights reserved.”
Click to More Senior News on the
Front Page
Copyright: SeniorJournal.com |
